This invention pertains to a voice-recognition camera which operates upon recognizing a voice input. With the advancement of voice-recognition technology, a camera that performs specific operations upon recognizing an input voice or a key word (vocal instruction/command) registered in advance has been under consideration. The user of such a camera can release the shutter by simply telling the camera, "Release." The user does not have to worry about a blurred picture due to the movement of camera caused by the manual releasing action, or he can remotely control the camera.
The conventional voice-recognition camera, however, has problems: first, the camera has no means for a user to check whether his/her voice is registered or recognized by the camera. Consequently, the user cannot determine if the cause of failures, such as a register error or a malfunction of the camera upon voice input, is in the voice recognition system or camera mechanism. It is true that there is no approach presented to this problem so far; second, the vocal instructions for this type of camera are registered conventionally by a recognition circuit system in the register mode according to the sequence determined by the circuit system. For example, multiple switch are installed on the camera; the first switch is for registering an instruction voice for release operation (for example, "release"); the second switch is for registering an instruction voice for self-timer operation (for example, "self-timer"), and so forth.
However, under the conventional registration system, the user must understand the corresponding relations between individual input switches and camera operations, and it makes the voice registration system complicated. This often causes erroneous registration, for example, by depressing the switch for the self-timer when the switch for the release operation should be depressed instead. Moreover, changing a registered instruction voice is similarly complicated.